The girl sitting on the window-sill in the sunshine drew a long breath. There was more in life than these two had found; all unknowingly, they had proved it.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Charlotte kept them with her the week, then Molly turned restless.
“I can’t stand hearing another thing about Willy, Malise,” she declared. “I think he’s a very dictatorial and outspoken person myself.”
So Molly and Alexina and Celeste went back to the hotel, which had filled during the week of their absence. There was life and bustle in the halls as they went in and, from their windows up-stairs, they could see the lake gay with sail-boats.
The talk down-stairs concerned dances, picnics, fishing parties. The somnolent Molly awoke, languor fell from her and she stepped to the centre of the gay little whirl, the embodied spirit of festivity. Mr. Henderson, incongruous element, was there, too, with deliberate election it would seem, for Molly’s eyes did no inviting or encouraging. She did not need him in capacity of attendant or diverter these days, and it was clear that in any other capacity he embarrassed her. But he was not deterred because of that.
“You are coming to church, remember,” he told her on Sunday morning.
Molly did not even play at archness with him now; she looked timid. And at the hour she went, and Alexina with her. They had heard him officiate before, and it seemed the mere performance of the law; but into the dogmatic assertions of his discourse to-day glowed that fire which is called inspiration. The Reverend Henderson was living these days.